I'm excited to introduce a new way for marketers and product managers to get answers to their most pressing issues and challenges. Forrester has launched an online community for technology marketers and product managers as the premier destination for leaders to exchange ideas, opinions, and real-world solutions with each other. Forrester analysts will also be part of the community, helping facilitate the discussions and sharing their views.

The community is open to all technology marketers and product managers.

Here’s what you’ll find:

A simple platform on which you can pose your questions and get advice from peers who face the same business or technology challenges.

Insight from our analysts, who weigh in frequently on the issues and point to relevant research.

Fresh perspective from peers, who share their real-world success stories, best practices, and templates.

Content on the latest technologies and trends affecting your business — from Forrester and other thought leaders.

I encourage you to become part of the community:

Ask a question about a business or technology problem.

Start a discussion on an emerging trend that’s having an impact on your work.

Contribute to an existing discussion thread from a community member.

Share templates with your peers for common artifacts like social media guidelines or campaign outlines.

Categories:

In the mid- to late-90s, many business leaders observed the advent of the Web and asked the wrong question: “What will the Internet do for us?” Instead, they should have been asking, “What will the Internet do to us?”

The difference between these two questions is the difference between a false sense of security and a necessity for action. It’s the difference between Amazon organizing itself around the online channel in 1994 and Barnes & Noble opening an e-commerce site in 1997—today Amazon is worth $55.7B and Barnes & Noble has a $1.1B market cap. It’s also the difference between newspapers struggling with a 70% decline in classified advertising over the course of a decade and eBay seeing revenues increase over 1900% in the same period.

Today, many business leaders are again asking the wrong question: “What will social media do for us?” instead of “What will social media do to us?” The difference between those two questions will define the business winners and losers of the next decade. Let’s explore what social media already is doing to business and how organizations must adapt.